


here isn’t where i wanna be

by storieswelove



Series: unfair we’re not somewhere misbehaving for days [2]
Category: The Queen's Thief - Megan Whalen Turner
Genre: F/M, Spoilers for Book 6: Return of the Thief (Queen's Thief), also apparently this is a rott smut series now so, as always they are extremely in love and deserve the world, but equally has some ~hot and heavy~ sex, cw: mentions of past miscarriage and current pregnancy, this one has some heavy convos!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-08
Updated: 2020-12-08
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:08:22
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27958157
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/storieswelove/pseuds/storieswelove
Summary: But Eugenides, always a step ahead, had other ideas. “On your knees, my queen,” he said, turning her with a hand on her shoulder, so that she faced away from him. He kissed the back of her neck.*In the council tent in the middle of the army campsite, Irene and Gen, afraid for the future, steal themselves a moment of comfort in each other’s arms.
Relationships: Attolia | Irene/Eugenides
Series: unfair we’re not somewhere misbehaving for days [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2047178
Comments: 11
Kudos: 30





	here isn’t where i wanna be

**Author's Note:**

> It appears that I, a person who was absolutely not going to write _Return of the Thief_ smut, am in fact writing a **series** of _Return of the Thief_ smut. Blame it on this damn book and Arctic Monkeys’ “R U Mine,” which has the b e s t Irenides sex vibes to match this book.

The fight had gone out of Gen all at once. His arm, raised to throw only moments earlier, dropped limply to his side. The map stone in his fist fell to the carpeted floor with a barely audible _thud,_ tumbling and rolling across the ground before settling in a low point of exposed grass. 

Eugenides and Irene stood staring at each other from several paces away, both silent. Gen chewed on the inside of his lip. 

“Irene,” he said weakly, seized by still-fresh grief and fear of what might come to pass. The queen nodded twice. She, too, was afraid. Gen tried to speak again. He asked, “How long?” 

“Three or four months.” 

“Four _mon_ —” 

“— _Gen._ ”

With a word, she silenced him. The king scrubbed his face. They still stood apart, the three steps between them cavernous. 

Eugenides’s breathing was still visibly labored when he said, “What are we going to do? We can’t lose you. _I_ can’t lose you.” He sounded as though his heart was breaking. 

“I am perfectly capable of—” 

“— _Irene_.” It was Gen’s turn to be reasonable. His need to comfort her overrode the fear that had frozen him in place, and he reached out to her, closing the gap between them. He took her hand. 

“Irene,” he said, more softly. “Last time…” Gen dropped his chin to his chest for just a moment. He let out a deep breath before looking back up at his wife, whose body was still rigid. “We are in the middle of a godsforsaken field, in the middle of what I pray is not a godsforsaken war. If you become ill again…”

“Then I will die,” she said flatly. Before he could respond, mouth half-open and face already twisted in horror, she added, “Just like the men who have already died, and like so many more men will die in this war. There is no guarantee of survival, not ever, but certainly not in war. What _is_ certain,” she continued, ignoring the agonized look on his face, “is that we will _not_ persevere if I am not here. _Everyone_ will die, and we will lose you, and this war, and Attolia and Sounis and perhaps even Eddis. My life is not worth that, Gen,” she said, more softly now. “No single life is worth that.” Attolia was not just comforting her husband. She had had time to prepare, both her words but also herself, in the weeks she had kept her pregnancy secret from the king. 

Eugenides watched her, eyes dark and shining, hand still gripping hers. She stared back with an equally solemn expression. Finally, he closed his eyes briefly, and when he opened them again, asked, “Are you well?” 

“Well enough.” When he raised an eyebrow at her, she said, “I have been sick, in the mornings. But no worse than the last time.” 

“How did I not know?” Eugenides asked, voice tinged with pain and brow furrowed. He prided himself on his observation skills, and here in the middle of a campsite, with no pretense of separate bedrooms or more than a canvas sheet between their bed and the necessaries, he was disturbed not to have realized. 

Irene gestured at her abdomen with her left hand. With her height and changed shape from her recent pregnancy, the tiny bulge was not noticeable, even undressed. “You forget that you are not the only liar in this relationship.” She had been careful, in the mornings, not to let him see that she was ill. The shouts of men and clanking of armor while the campsites readied for the day’s march had hidden the sounds of her being sick. 

Releasing her hand, Gen wrapped both of his arms around Irene, careful as ever with his hook. He buried his face in the crook of her neck. “I am afraid,” he admitted, though it hardly needed saying. “I am sorry. You deserve better.” 

“Pray the gods we all deserve better than what we face right now,” she said dryly, but she wrapped her arms around him in turn, her own face pressed against the side of his head. She kissed his temple. 

“Are you glad?” he asked, kissing her temple. He was not asking about the war. 

“Yes.” Irene was glad, more so than she thought she had any right to be. It was not the prospect of an heir that pleased her. Irene wanted children desperately. She wanted to be a mother — had already been a mother, in her mind, when she lost the child the previous fall. Not even a war for her country could extinguish the tiny hope inside her that, at the end of this nightmare, she might soon hold her child in her arms. 

“I am too,” Gen admitted, wrapping his arms still tighter around her, careful to position himself around her ribcage. Sometimes he still acted like she might break. He kissed her again on her neck, and when she relaxed under his touch, he trailed kisses softly upward, across her jaw. She tilted her face down in response, and he kissed her even more lightly on the mouth. Irene raised her hand to his cheek and kissed him again, more deeply this time, both of their bodies relaxing now. 

Breaking the kiss, Gen tipped his forehead against his wife’s. “Are you well enough for…” 

“Yes, Gen,” she said with a small smile. “I was well enough last night, I am well enough tonight.” 

He smiled in return, a grin that worked its way past the exhaustion and fear and chagrin in his eye to make them sparkle. She saw, for an instant, his whole self, not the ghost of the people they’d been since Costis had arrived exhausted on horseback during the Festival of Moira to warn them of the Mede approach. 

Hand already roaming up her back, Eugenides kissed her with purpose now, teasing her mouth open while his hand worked its way up her spine. 

Irene, hand still cupping her husband’s face, felt her dress go slack around her shoulders. Pulling back from his mouth reluctantly, she arched an eyebrow at his smug grin. 

“And how exactly will I be leaving the council tent? Or have you learned to tie a knot with one hand?” Irene might have tied it herself, but the dress was meant to be tied from behind. 

Gen’s eyes, pupils already blown, widened. His mouth slipped from its grin to a sheepish — but still pleased — “o”. 

“Ah.” 

“Ah indeed.” 

He peered around her back at the slack ribbon and fabric. “Well, the damage is already done,” he said cheerfully, and pulled at the strings to loosen them further, mouth already pressed against hers again. Kissing her deeply, his fingers worked their way up the ribbons until the dress was loose enough that one could just — 

“See?” Gen said with the boyish grin as his eyes roamed over her now-naked body. While she had had her hands splayed across the back of his thighs, arms almost completely by her sides, Gen had deftly slipped the dress over her shoulders. The quick jerk of her arms in surprise was all it had taken for the dress to slide off completely. 

Irene looked down at the pile of fabric now encircling her feet. Shaking her head, she rolled her eyes, but she kissed him again. He grinned into it, overly pleased with himself. She was grateful for his levity, though she would not dare tell him.

It was not her first war, but they never got easier. Irene’s nerves were raw, frayed around the edges, from bearing the weight of more than any one person should — and, these last few months, it was for two. 

The more they kissed, the more desperate she was to feel and not think. She made to undo his trousers, but he pushed her hand aside. Pulling back from her mouth, Gen looked around, considering for the first time where they might eventually land. 

“I am _not_ getting on the floor,” Irene said. She was too old and too pregnant to lever herself back up again with any grace. She crossed against her chest, feeling oddly exposed in the dim light. She was determined to stand her ground. Being queen had _some_ privileges. And being with Eugenides, well. Irene always got what she wanted. 

“No need for that, my dear. We’re not animals,” he said with a twinkle in his eye. They both remembered well the early days of their marriage, when they had stolen time together whenever they could. Making love on the floor had been far from out of the question then. 

Gen pushed her backwards, hand on her hip to steady her. Irene stepped out of the circle of the dress and let him lead her, wrapping her arms around his neck for balance. She bent down to kiss him again. She knew she would not fall. 

He stopped her just short of knocking backwards onto a low couch, her calves just brushing the upholstery. 

Irene looked over her shoulder at the stiff, low backed sofa. It was far too small to be useful — Gen’s shorter, slight frame might lay there comfortably, but she certainly could not — and too shallow for her to sit on his lap, not with the way her shins and her feet might dangle off the edge, unable to find purchase. 

But Eugenides, always a step ahead, had other ideas. 

“On your knees, my queen,” he said, turning her with a hand on her shoulder, so that she faced away from him. He kissed the back of her neck. 

Irene levered herself onto the couch, knees spread at just the right width so she might bring her hips level with his. She did not have to turn to look, the memory of a hundred nights positioned just like this that settled her body into place. She may not be able to see his pretty face, but the angle and force the position allowed, and the way Irene’s body melted into it, made up for it. 

As she held herself in place, arms and head resting along the low wooden back, Gen kissed along the length of her spine, lining himself up and sliding into her. He moved achingly slowly, almost reverential in his movements, ghosting his hand along the length of her spine as he rolled his hips back and forth.

But Irene had grown more eager still, desperate to lose herself in the feel of her husband’s body and forget anything but his rapid breathing and the feeling as he slammed against her, rocking her back and forth with a force that made her entire body reverberate as she braced herself against it. 

“Harder,” she said, voice commanding, and he redoubled his efforts. She moaned each time he drove down, the sound of his body slapping against her thighs growing louder and faster, the stinging pain against her legs and inside her an intoxicating burn. It was nothing near her peak, but she wanted this, the pain edging on pleasure so intense that she could not think, could feel only this, chasing away her troubles, leaving her with only the here and now of her own body and her husband behind her, inside her. His fingers gripped her hip, as she sought to balance the uneven pressure of his hold with her own right arm. Her muscles loosened with each stroke of his hips against hers. 

Gen pulled back, eager and determined to give her what she wanted. “Put your knees closer together,” he said, hand still on her hip to steady her as she moved her already-trembling legs at his behest. When she was settled, he lifted his right leg onto the seat beside her, slipping back inside, a little clumsy with his exhaustion and desire. 

What he lost in speed with one leg up, he made up for in force, the angle driving her mad, hitting a spot that made Irene stifle a scream in her arms, vaguely aware, at least, that the canvas walls did nothing to hide the sound. She rocked her hips back against him and he pushed into her, the combined force working away the tension in both of their bodies. 

“Irene, I’m—“ 

His rhythm turned erratic as he finished, giving her a last few, frantic jerks of his hips as he came down from his high. Still inside her, Gen leaned forward and rested his chest against her spine. His sweat-damp shirt clung to him, and her skin was cool against his own overheated face. 

Irene took deep, steadying breaths, feeling the muscles in her body looser than they had been in weeks, maybe months. As Gen’s breath evened out behind her, he planted soft kisses across her back before pulling out and straightening up. Still on her knees, she straightened her back and braced herself against the couch as she lowered her feet to the floor behind her, one foot at at a time. 

As she stood, Gen collapsed onto the sofa next to her, wriggling his trousers up from his ankles and lifting his hips to button them clumsily. He pulled her toward him, between his legs, one foot wrapped around the back of her calf. Slumped back, arms stretched out on either side of him across the low back of the couch, he said, still winded, “That was...very good.” He grinned up at her from under his lashes. 

She smiled down at him, feeling the muscles in her face soften as only her husband could elicit. “So.” 

“Just one so? No, I can do better than that,” he said, waggling his eyebrows at her and straightening up. He took stock of his position and the angle he would need. His hook rested in his lap. 

“Eugenides, what are you doing?” she asked, more chastising than question — she knew exactly what he was doing. 

“Earning myself better than a ‘so,’ that’s what.” He pushed her back lightly and slid to the floor, now on his knees himself. 

“Gen…” 

He looked up at her, face mischievous and eager, and it drove a wave of want in her so fierce she had to steady herself lest she stumble where she stood. Though perhaps, she thought, that was the pounding she’d taken only a moment before. He was still, waiting for her permission. 

Biting her lip, she nodded, and reached down between her legs, opening herself up for his mouth so that he might keep his steadying hand on her thigh. Gen went to task, licking at her folds that were already sensitive with pleasure. Irene’s breath quickened as he worked her with his mouth, biting and sucking and swirling his tongue. She moved her hand to his head, winding it tightly in his hair and he groaned — he _always_ groaned when she pulled at it while he had his mouth inside her. He grew more eager as she gripped at his curls, his tongue focusing on the upper left corner of her clit, the exact spot that he knew well would make her come undone. 

Irene might have worried that their silhouettes were visible to the guards and attendants waiting outside, that their groans might be audible though the thin canvas walls in the quiet — well, relative quiet, it was never truly quiet during war — of the evening, but she did not, too focused on the pressure building in her belly and beneath his tongue, vision already going black around the edges as he drew her close to the edge. 

Her grip in his hair tightened and she reached out for support but found nothing but air — the bench was too far, in an otherwise empty corner of the room. But like a miracle, like he could read her mind, as he could always anticipate her every need, Eugenides released her leg and his hand appeared, gripping hers, and the support was enough. 

She came hard, mind blissfully blank save for the rush of pleasure across her skin, permeating every inch of her body, until she forgot the fight and the danger and the godsforsaken war. It was enough. 

And then Gen was standing, hand still in hers, helping her gently to the bench where she slumped, utterly spent. 

He sat down next to her, rubbing a soothing hand up across her shoulders as she composed herself. He cupped the back of her neck and kissed her on the side of the head. 

“I love you,” he whispered, voice heavy with exhaustion and emotion. She was not the only one who had wanted to forget. 

Irene rested her head against his and sat a while longer. 

Finally, she looked at her gown, a pile of bright red fabric on the floor in the center of the tent, the velvet shimmering even in the dim light. She shook her head. 

“Now, what will we do about my dress?” 

Gen laughed in surprise. He had forgotten about the dress. 

“Come,” he said, standing and offering her his hand. “We will find a way. We have solved worse.” 

There was no easy solution. In his mirth and his haste, Eugenides had not just pulled the laces, but pulled some completely undone. Rethreading it was an almost impossible task for a one-handed man, and Irene’s limbs still shook from the excitement of the evening. There were two quick solutions, neither of them leaving her with much dignity. 

“I would lend you my coat but…” 

She snorted delicately. None of her husband’s more fitted clothing would fit her. She stifled a laugh at the image of herself, arms stuffed tight into sleeves several inches too short, walking through the camp. He guessed what she was thinking and smirked. 

So Irene did her best tying the dress loosely in front of her and sliding it around, unpinning her hair so that it fell long down her back, covering up the barely-closed dress behind her. She handed the pins to Gen, who slipped them in the pocket of his jacket. 

He touched her face. “My beautiful queen,” he said, looking at her with a fondness that still made her heart ache, all these many years later. Gen’s eyes were wet, and she felt her own stinging. The trouble with distractions was that they always came to an end. 

Reaching up to touch his face in turn, she wiped away the few tears that had fallen. “None of that today, Gen. One day at a time. Out here, only one day at a time.”

He nodded and kissed her one last time. Then, arm in arm, they left the stillness of tent, collecting their retinues as they went, and made their way across the teeming army campsite together.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks, as always, to [hippolytas](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hippolytas/pseuds/hippolytas), both for her beta and her unrelenting desire to talk about the _Return of the Thief_ smut as much as me.  
> Thanks for reading!! Always on the hunt for prompts, as long as you don’t mind if it takes me a couple months to fill them! Come scream about QT with me on tumblr @ [storieswelove](storieswelove.tumblr.com) or [the Queen's Thief discord](https://discord.gg/JYJufae).


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